Scandal 4. Obama administration tells defense contractors to violate federal law. Bonus: Obama administration says it will use taxpayer dollars to pay any government fines incurred. This scandal is still ongoing, and it could be a big one. The Obama administration entered into a spending deal with Congress, by which automatic budget cuts will start slicing away unless the politicians act to stop them and find other places to cut or raise revenue. Some of the biggest cuts will hit defense contractors. Those contractors are required by federal law to inform their workers if layoffs may be close at hand. Thanks to sequestration, layoffs are close at hand unless the politicians hammer out a deal, which they haven’t done. So Lockheed was set to send out the pink slips, but on Friday and then against Monday the Obama administration told them not to. That command is in violation of federal law. The Obama administration doubled down on that illegal command, by telling the contractors that the government, which would collect any penalties resulting from the failure to give out the layoff notices, will pay the fines. Wrap that around your head for a second — the government is commanding contractors to break the law, which in ordinary circumstances would trigger monetary penalties and might render that contractor ineligible for future government contracts. And on top of that, the government says it will use taxpayer dollars to pay the penalties, which would go to the government — in other words, itself.

How is this scandal not both a late night comic’s dream and a fertile patch for an intrepid reporter to cultivate?

Scandal 5: Libya. The short version of the Libya scandal goes like this. President Barack Obama has been skipping more than half of his Presidential Daily Briefings. His State Department sent an ambassador to war-torn Libya, but did no threat assessment before handing him a consulate in Benghazi, Libya. Benghazi isn’t exactly a tourist destination. In the post-Gaddafi Libya that Obama helped create via a war of dubious legality, Benghazi is a lawless hotbed of al-Qaeda and related terrorist activity. The consulate in Benghazi was given no Marine protection and in fact did not have the standard security arrangements at all. It was protected by local militias for hire. Such arrangements tend to find cheap local fighters of highly questionable loyalty.

On Sept 8, 2012, the U.S. government starts to get warnings that terrorists intend to strike in Cairo, Egypt, and in Libya. Threats in Libya against the U.S. ambassador there had been ramping up for months. On Sept 11, 2012, the terrorists strike and in Libya, they sack the largely unprotected U.S. consulate and murder the ambassador along with three other Americans.

On that evening the U.S. embassy in Cairo denounces a YouTube video as the inspiration for the attacks. The Obama administration in Washington is silent, though it learned of the attack on the consulate in Benghazi within 90 minutes of its beginning. The president himself learned that Ambassador Chris Stevens was missing as a result of the attack, yet went to bed and learned of Stevens’ death the following morning. The day after the attacks, President Obama and Secretary of State Clinton suggested that the attack was both an act of terror and a response to the YouTube film, which had been produced by an obscure figure who may be a con man in the United States (and then Obama jetted off to Vegas for a fundraiser). In the ensuing days, the Obama administration would tell America that the attack in Benghazi was “spontaneous,” not pre-planned, though the U.S. intelligence community viewed that attack as a terrorist strike within the first 24 hours.

That same week, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Martin Dempsey, called an obscure anti-Islamist preacher in Florida to urge him not to support the obscure YouTube film lest more riots and violence occur. At the end of that week, the Obama Justice Department had tracked the obscure filmmaker down in California, publicly identified him, and rousted him at midnight for “questioning” and a media perp walk. That filmmaker is now in jail on probation violations. As of yet, the word “scapegoat” has not been used by anyone in the mainstream media to describe what has been done here. So for any intrepid reporters out there reading this, that term is yours for the taking and the shaping. No need to credit me.

The Obama administration’s false version of events culminated on Sunday, Sept 16, 2012, when the administration sent U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice on five nationally televised political talk shows to describe the Benghazi attack as “spontaneous.” Rice said that, according to the intelligence she had received, the attack was not pre-planned and was a response to the YouTube movie. That has turned out not to be true, at all.

Despite the fact that administration officials including the president’s own spokesman have publicly described Benghazi as a terrorist attack, President Obama used his recent address to the United Nations to blame the film, again.

Possible motives for this ongoing cover-up before our eyes include but are not limited to any of the following:

President Obama had been skipping his intel briefings in favor of campaigning, and attacks on U.S. soil occurred on his watch on an anniversary that he and his team really ought to have planned better for.

Clinton’s State Department failed to predict and plan for the chaos that it helped author in Libya, resulting in the first field killing of a U.S. ambassador since 1979. Clinton still has a political future to think about.

The Obama administration has argued that since the death of Osama bin Laden, al-Qaeda is on the ropes and on the road to defeat. But if al-Qaeda coordinated attacks against the U.S. in two of the so-called “Arab Spring” states, is the administration’s line accurate, or is it a fantasy?

President Obama really did believe that his inauguration would help usher in peace with the terrorists. Terrorist attacks on U.S. soil, on the anniversary of 9-11, leave him baffled and confused.

The Obama-Clinton-Rice-Jarrett policy of helping push the Arab Spring has resulted in rising Islamist power across the Middle East. The administration believes that, rather than acknowledge the reality that it has helped spread chaos that might trigger a massive regional or even world war, it’s preferable to curb American free speech rights and use the might of the state to intimidate obscure preachers and turn hack movie makers into political prisoners.

So there you go. Five big scandals to chew on, any one of which have the potential to bring down a president. A couple of them are easily bigger and juicier than Watergate. A couple even have body counts. A couple could be linked together to show a pattern of lawless behavior.

Get to work, intrepid reporter. You don’t need Deep Throat, and you don’t need to be Woodward or Bernstein. You just need to follow up on any one of these five massive scandals and report them fully in the mainstream media.

I should advise you, you won’t win any Pulitzers and you’ll probably get fired. But you just might save your country.

Bryan Preston has been a leading conservative blogger and opinionator since founding his first blog in 2001. Bryan is a military veteran, worked for NASA, was a founding blogger and producer at Hot Air, was producer of the Laura Ingraham Show and, most recently before joining PJM, was Communications Director of the Republican Party of Texas.

Click here to view the 71 legacy comments

Click here to hide legacy comments

71 Comments, 56 Threads

1.
bianchi_roadie

“Wrap that around your head for a second — the government is commanding contractors to break the law, which in ordinary circumstances would trigger monetary penalties and might render that contractor ineligible for future government contracts.”

*Ding* – The admin is hoping contractors are short sighted enough to think that they can protect their current contracts if they play ball. Only then they’ll find themselves in a very compromised position: The admin can hold the risk of prosecution if they don’t play ball in the future.

I don’t think this is the full intention – the admin hasn’t shown that much thought and more often just reacts to the latest news cycle – whatever will get them over the current crisis. However, it does put them in a position of even greater power over contractors who follow their suggestion and (potentially) break the law.

What the contractors aren’t taking into consideration….if B.O. doesn’t win the election, they will be facing massive fines, and possible other charges by the new administration. They’d be wise to ignore B.O., and follow the letter of the law…

Fast and Furious. Just what did the administration hope to accomplish by letting guns get into the hands of drug cartel operators without tracking those guns adequately.
We all know the answer: They hoped to show that illegal guns were coming mostly from the U.S. (instead of where they were really coming from: Guatemala, Europe, South America, Asia, even Russia), thereby providing a fabricated excuse to take guns out of the hands of law-abiding Americans.

Kathleen Sebelius breaks federal law, keeps her job.
“Mad Maxine” Waters does too, but we can correct these injustices on November 6.

Obama administration leaks sensitive national security information for political purposes.
Has this administration taken any action whatsoever for anything other than political purposes? National security and the best interests of the people are secondary to this twisted administration.

Obama administration tells defense contractors to violate federal law. Bonus: Obama administration says it will use taxpayer dollars to pay any government fines incurred.
Only problem is, some aren’t going along, i.e. Lockheed Martin. Obama did say he would have the most transparent administration in history, and the transparency of this is so obvious, most Americans will see right through it.

Libya.
Romney should be saying in every speech he gives, “Do you really want your sons & daughters entering a military commanded by someone who won’t even watch their backs and calls deaths at U.S. embassies ‘a bump in the road’?”

How do the following get left off? Maybe its time to expand to top ten.

Solyndra and all the corrupt green energy crony capitalisting lobbying? In fact, all the corrupt, vote-buying stuff that went on?

How about the abuse of regulatory powers in the case of Boeing, Gibson guitars Lacey act extortion, and every other industry to intimidate opponents on behalf of big labor? With Boeing, the administration denied the rights of actual workers before the Labor board … because the workers were on Boeing’s side, not Big Labor.

How about the Pigford settlement? $50,000 checks for 90,000 farmers, only 18,000 of whom actually farmed, as part of an election promise to buy votes in the Deep South in the 2008 primary.

Romney was criticized and ridiculed by Obama and Biden for stating that(paraphrasing): “Spending millions and millions to find one man (Osama Bin Laden) isn’t productive. We must concentrate on the threat of terrorism.”

Narrative for Obama: I killed Bin Laden therefore the War on Terror is over and I ended it. Not so much.

GM lives: 27% of GM production is in the USA. They are exempt from paying Federal Corporate Taxes for 5 years and they still owe us money. Nothing to see here folks move along.

The end game for the debt is to run it up to 25 Trillion and then declare insolvency. Just like the GM Bondholders the Treasury Bondholders are all rich so screw them. Power to the people.

The end game for the debt is to run it up to 25 Trillion and then declare insolvency.
–Allan Crain

If that’s the clever plan of the spendthrift socialists (of all parties), we’re all doomed. One of the few things the US Constitution absolutely guarantees that the federal government must do is make good on the federal debt.

And prior to Nov 6, the administration will tell the new black panthers to intimidate and assault conservative voters at the poll stations and if any of them are charged the administration will pardon them. And if any happen to get convicted, the administration will drag a white guy off the street to serve the time.

This is not directly related to your list, but I believe the fight to prevent ID when voting is an attempt to increase voter fraud.

Recently I was in one of the most poverty-stricken areas of Orlando assisting someone. Trust me, this is an area that tourists would be advised to avoid. I have never in my life been asked to show picture ID so often at businesses. I don’t know how anyone could live in this area without some sort of picture ID. The reality is that the poorer you are the more necessary it becomes to have ID merely to conduct your daily business.

What chance is there of the national media of following up on any of these scandals? For them Obama can do now wrong. Even the whole Libya fiasco is centered on Romneys comments,and other than Fox news it is barely mentioned. NBC news has become a constant harrangue on Romney, Ryan, and the Republican party. The comedians, the late night shows all add to the attacks on Conservatives by ridiculing anybody speaking out against Obama. If Obama wins I believe it will be payback time. He will then try to get rid of talk radio,Rush Limbaugh, and Fox News.

You forgot the following, which also would have been “-gate” level scandals for any Republican:

Obamaphone – millions of phones given for free (at regular customers’ expense) to low income voters from a site with prominent mention of President Obama being the source of the phone. If we had actual reporters in this country they might look to see which states benefited most from these free phones. I suspect they would find a close correlation between the highest phone distribution and battleground 2012 election states.

Regal Presidency – Obama has implemented more than an order of magnitude more executive orders than any previous President, many of which are blatantly illegal, and all of which are in service of his far left ideology.

Obamacare – Remember that? Remember the “Cornhusker kickback”? What about the “Louisiana Purchase?” Anybody notice how many of Obama’s campaign contributors have been given exemptions? This “law” was passed through blatantly improper means, violating not only House and Senate rules, but federal law itself.

IRS harassment – Several prominent Republican donors have been targeted by the IRS in ways that appear to be completely improper and politically biased.

Iran/Israel – “I’m too busy campaigning to deal with a potential nuclear threat to the Middle East. Call back after the election, if you’re still alive.”

Very nice round-up. Linked and shared on FB. I posted it along with the following note:

A nice, tidy little primer. I invite my Obama-supporting friends to explain to me how these (what should be) scandals (but curiously are not) are A) not important; B) racist to mention; and/or C) business-as-usual or nothing different than we could expect from a Romney administration. Ready… Go! (P.S. “It’s Bush’s fault” is getting a little shopworn, but trot it out if that’s all you’ve got)

I don’t expect to get too many responses from those on the other side of the fence.

Ditto to PrincetonAl – Let’s not forget Solyndra and all the other green energy money laundering schemes that put billions of taxpayer dollars in the hands of political supporters who simply funneled it back to Team Barry’s bank account.

Ant one of these would trigger impeachment proceedings for a Republican.

Of these scandels, I am most interested (at the moment) in how hispanics are going to absorb F&F. Will it be enough, if not to swing their votes, to at least keep them unenthusiastic and home on election day?

What? It’s no big deal that Kathleen Sebelius openly violated the Hatch Act. What could possibly be so dangerous about mixing blatant political ideology with authoritarian control over our healthcare? It’s not like the Anorexic Jackboot has the authority to decide who lives or who dies. It’s not like she could just decide to ban a medicine or procedure that has a track record of healing people. It’s not like she has the authority to ration care. Good thing they passed that bill before they read what was in it.

How about the BILLIONS of dollars (at least $6.4 billion, if memory serves me) funneled by the Obama Administration to NON-EXISTENT congressional districts, never to be seen again. Six point four billion. Nary a peep from the snoozing media “watchdogs”.

As many here have pointed out, there are many more candidates than the five mentioned in the article. The problem is that there have been so many and NOTHING has been done about any of them. The Won’s transgressions have become so common and blatant that they simply have lost their value to shock or create any response to their illegality. We have, in a sense, become like the citizens of a third world dictatorship in which no one is surprised by the antics of the thuggish buffoons running their country.

Ahead of these, I’d put the fact that our First Black President, instead of stepping up and leading an assault on the scandalous time-bomb of the endless mis-education of black youth in the inner cities, chose to remain silent, to not support charter schools or vouchers, even in Washington, D.C., which could have been the perfect demonstration-project city, and instead allied himself with the teachers union for purely selfish political reasons. Hope and Change? Instead, a rotten, shameful, inexcusable performance.

The Obama-Clinton-Holder administration criminally provided guns to the extremely barbaric Mexican drug cartels, facilitating the murders of hundreds of innocents. The administration have blood on their hands. MURDER is against the law. Why are the guilty not being prosecuted? Is it now ACCEPTABLE for the government to cause the cruel murders of innocent children and adults? NO ONE IN THIS COUNTRY or ANY other country will be safe from now on!

The great nation of America was once a light to the whole world. How dim that light has become.

Beautiful and innocent Mexican children and adults, rest in eternal peace.

Another thought, regarding the sequestration issue and the administration promising to indemnify the contractors if they don’t abide by federal law and notify their employees that a layoff will result.

Exactly where is this money supposed to come from? I seriously doubt the House of Representatives would have allocated funding for such a proposal, so where is the administration getting the funding to bribe the contractors?

Now, we should make one on what would have been a major scandal had George Bush or any other Republican can undertaken the exact same action.

1)Using the NLRB to attack a private corporation’s attempt to create jobs in a non-union state.

2)Attacking a major religion and forcing it to bend to the will of the government.

3)Attacking free speech on behalf of an organized religion, not the one listed above. Gestapo midnight raids and perp walking the free speech proponent.

4)Invasion of a sovereign territory to put a hit out on a figurehead in hiding.

5)Summarily eliminating “a hit list” in a whack by drone campaign, with collateral damage being swept under the rug.

6)Taking taxpayer money to crony capitalize a failing business enterprise, then going to a bundler to throw last gasp money at it, by cutting a sweetheart deal that screws those same taxpayers.

7)Failing to produce a budget during an entire term of office.

8)Providing cover for a racist theater act at a polling place, with threats of murder for babies of a certain race.

9)A DOJ that does not believe in race neutral application of our civil rights laws.

The Lawless Presidency, rife with ultra vires acts, breaches of fiduciary duties, usurpation of powers not granted to the executive branch, coverups, taxation hidden and not disclosed…thereby without representation, abuse of executive privilege, ….ANY Republican undertaking these acts would be under daily assault. A barrage of spewed rage would emanate from the very pores of the Mass Media and the Democratic Party…I write that as if they are separate entities, which they clearly are not.

ALL of the above would be major “scandals” in a Republican administration. They don’t even move the needle an inch in the conspiracy between the Propaganda and Lies Ministry and the Obama administration.

IF…a REPUBLICAN administration had invaded a foreign territory without consultation to put out a hit on a figurehead in hiding…invading their airspace and conducting a mission on their soil…clearly without permission or coordination, THAT ACT WOULD HAVE BEEN SCANDALIZED BY THE MEDIA.

The “anti-war” crowd (which is no such thing) would have been screaming and inciting Pakistanis to revolt.

The media would have derided the mission as risky, foolish, and relatively useless, except for cathartic revenge value…they would have written endlessly about how it would have little strategic value and actually could backfire.

You may have missed the subtleties of the entire post, how IF IT HAD BEEN A REPUBLICAN administration, ALL of the numbered items would have been major scandals. Killing bin Laden was not a scandal, Einstein.

Let’s not forget:
- Administration pressured senior military officer to change his testimony to benefit Obama contributor’s company, Lightsquared.
- No prosecution against Corzine for losing billions of $ of investor money
- Virtual moratorium/slowdown on drilling permits in violation of federal judge’s order
- No Democrat votes for Obama’s budget proposal, yet Obama blames GOP for obstruction
- No Senate budget proposal for more than 3 years, yet Obama blames GOP for obstruction
- Obamacare not televised on C-Span as promised, GOP literally locked out of negotiations, Obama promised no legislation that increased the deficit
- Quantitative Easing has caused inflation of gas and food, hitting the poor the hardest
- Justice Dept refuses to prosecute black violators of federal election laws, claims those laws not written to protect white people
- illegal firing and/or smearing of independent Inspector Generals when they are set to report findings that indict Obama allies for wrongdoing
- Failure to support Iraq by messing up negotiations to keep US troops in Iraq (General estimated needed 10k, Obama refused to allow more than 5k, failed to meet deadlines in negotiations w/ Iraqis, so deal scuttled)
- countless transparency hypocrisies…

That’s not accurate. There’s nothing illegal about not sending the layoff notices out; it just means they’re on the hook for severance if they don’t. The illegal part is the government offering to pay the severance. The contractors aren’t breaking the law, the administration is.

The big question I still have about Libya is, if Benghazi was so dangerous, what was our ambassador doing there in the first place? In addition, if he had to go there for some strange reason, why didn’t he have A LOT more security, or at the very least why wasn’t the consulate there more heavily defended by armed US Marines? In all of this I still haven’t heard why the ambassador was there to begin with, especially on the sensitive anniversary of 9/11. Until we get an answer to that question, nobody will be held accountable for this.

Where are the majority Republicans to sound the drums on this? Time for the true conservatives to oust the establishment republicans and RINOs. Need to get Rove to shut up and for Ann Coulter to silence her shrill yapping so these scandals can be brought to the forefront, instead of bashing republican candidates who are not part of their “establishment”. M. Malikan should be on the airwaves a bit more as she clearly articulates what needs to be pointed out.

You are wasting your time if you think providing facts, or being sarcastically truthful is going to change any minds at Big Media. It’s way to late for them to get religion. They already took the money (or whatever)

The new Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI) FOIA lawsuit filed in federal court demands documents on what appears to be a long-standing practice at the highest levels of the agency – using secret email accounts known only to “few EPA staff members, usually only high-level senior staff” – could be the sixth scandal no one’s asking about.

I have always smelled a rat (false flag) on the gulf oil spill. The timing on that and the time frame and sequence of events were perfect.

Obama, Chu and Salizar held off the top fill on the oil so he could get his moratorium completed to choke off oil exploration. Thousands of jobs lost in the southern gulf states (that he hates by the way for voting against him) and allows oil production to gear up off Brazil waters. Soros involvement? Sure looks like a set up too me.

The one problem with this article is that it is preaching to the choir. Most of the people reding this are in agreement with its conclusions, However, how does one reach the diehard obama supporters whose minds should be exposed to these scandals?

This is a great column. Personally, I would switch numbers 2 and 5, in order of importance. I posted this on FR http://fundamentalrefounding.ning.com/ for our patriot’s group. We have been following and discussing all these points.

This is the most corrupt administration in modern history. People dying, embassies burning, yet Obama sleeps… after all, he has a fundraiser and rally the next day.

THIS IS SCARY. DO YOU KNOW WHO PANETTA REALLY IS? Trevor Loudon Outs Leon Panetta: Video – Do You Know Who Panetta Really Is? Loudon on Ron Paul Foreign Policy New Zealander Trevor Loudon, the force behind the blog New Zeal speaks at this rally about Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta and who he really is. This is a life work for Loudon. Not so …READ MORE: http://bwcentral.org/2012/10/d…

I am so aware of all these scandals, yet nothing has been done to stop them! Why? Obama should be kicked out but he won’t be because he’s the first minority president and the Repubs and others are afraid of being called racist so they just talk and talk about him but do nothing, cowards!

And all the other lawbreakers like Sebellious and others should be fired? Why aren’t they? and Hillary Clinton should be fired, she did something so terrible to the Ambassador, She is really stupid, what qualifies her to be Secretary of State? I don’t know how she sleeps at night? And she may run for President? The nightmare will go on and on. We know Obama sleeps at night ’cause he went to a fundraiser right after the four of them were tortured and murdered!

This is a nightmare with Obama, scandal after scandal and nothing is done by our government We should all be ashamed of letting this go on and on and on. And he probably will be re-elected because of fraud and the media. We are really becoming a socialist country. It is scary and

Nakoula is a con man – he was convicted of fraud, and owes $700,000 in restitution. And he quite flagrantly violated the terms of his probation agreement: use of an alias and secret financial transactions, both expressly prohibited.

IMO, once his activities were publicized, he was going back to jail anyway. But the Feds calling the Cal probation office, and that midnight arrest, were stupid, ugly, and an offence to civil liberties.

With all respect, Mr. Preston, you seem to be a “mainstream media dummy” yourself! (But God Bless you for at least trying to list the litinany of Obama offenses).

The ONE which is as major as any…and easily an IMPEACHABLE OFFENSE that Mr. Obama at this very moment should be attoning for occurred just in the last three months! It is related to illegal aliens and the usurping (even by Obama’s own words of “Congress won’t act…so I will”) of constitutijonal authority from the legislative branch to the executive branch. By Obama granting “temporary” stays to a segment of illegal aliens found within our country he has DECREED LAW that, constitutionally, is the sole perogative of the legislative branch per our Constitution!!!

Again: Republicans right now should have drawn up articles of impeachment and started the deliberations by now. But being spineless, they will have nothing of it so close to the election. How sad… Both they and Obama were sworn to uphold the Constitution of the United States of America. And it is Congress’s DUTY to now enforce the Constitution…but they will not.

This sad event should surely have been in your “top five”. But it is nowhere to be found…

President Obama’s Administration is the cleanest in History,the dirtiest,Ronald “Myth” Reagan,who even beat out the “Crook”Tricky Dick Nixon’s bunch of criminals, and number 3 of course GW Bush,all Repubs I see!

Hey, before jumping the gun and allowing Barack Hussein Obama to fool some of you TWICE, then check out these 2000+ most controversial Anti-Obama videos, news articles, images and public commentary first at “The Anti-Obama Nation” Daily News Journal @ Facebook: